


Twilight

by notabrawler



Category: World Wrestling Entertainment
Genre: M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-10-09
Updated: 2014-10-09
Packaged: 2018-02-20 11:46:14
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 852
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/2427521
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/notabrawler/pseuds/notabrawler
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>The word “twilight” is sometimes used metaphorically, to imply that something is losing strength and approaching its end. - - - Seth contemplates leaving The Shield.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Twilight

**Author's Note:**

> This is pre-Shield break-up times. Obviously. Maybe. I dunno man just read it ok.

Crickets chirped and the last of the quieting birds cooed while Seth stood alone looking out over the horizon. Purples and pinks lit up the lines of the world around him, outlining the mountains and trees in luminous hues of violet. Tree branches cast purple shadows that stretched over the ground in all directions, sitting on the soil like veins that moved with the setting sun. The solitude the setting sun offered drew Seth outside in the first place. Somehow it was easier to be suffocated by toxic thoughts than to be in the company of his brothers.

“Hell of a sunset.”

The low timbre of Roman’s voice was a surprise among the relative silence of the evening—- not rough enough to be startling, but rather its comfortable quality reigned back a measure of order Seth could feel slipping away. Roman stepped out onto the balcony, tracing his index and middle finger along Seth’s lower back for just a moment before he moved beside the younger man.

“Mhm,” Seth agreed. The thoughts that had been stirring up his head and heart were impossible to cease, but around Roman he had to show some restraint.  
Roman was too perceptive. Perhaps he didn’t have the intelligence to rival Seth’s, or the ability to create strategies in the practical sense, but Roman was far from stupid—and he happened to be extremely observant. With this knowledge, Seth was wary to think damning thoughts in the older man’s presence. If anyone would be able to read him like a book, he knew it would be Roman.

“What’s this time of day called, again? Twilight?” Roman set his forearms on the railing, a lazy finger pointed at where the sun had already set, leaving behind a fan of soft colours in the sky.

“Yeah, twilight.” Seth felt he didn’t have the mental stamina to talk to Roman or Dean anymore. It was getting to the point where he hated himself for deceiving the two of them and ultimately found it was easier to hardly speak at all. But even that was hard, as though by saying nothing he was saying more than he could ever with his words. Only Seth had no defense besides his near silence, he’d forgotten how he was meant to behave— how Seth Rollins of The Shield would respond to his brothers. The last two years were a blur, losing grip of the person he was had been instant and inexplicably simple. The loss felt minimal on the surface, but inside him turmoil lurked, hiding within parts of him like unwanted artifacts he was forced to uncover.

“Hm, don’t think I like it.”

Seth turned to Roman then, questioning. The intuition he knew Roman for, the thing he knew for certain that Roman had over him, was looming. Roman had to know, he was too keen to Seth’s strange behaviour. Something about that made it worse, and Seth almost choked out his words.  
“Why’s that?”

Roman smiled bitterly— a smile Seth hadn’t seen before, but instantly recognized the grief it carried. It was still painstakingly beautiful and able to outdistance the world around them that bathed in dimming shades of purple. Maybe that was why it hurt more, because Roman looked impossibly innocent with a smile that looked completely condemned. There was no denying the immense sense of disappointment Seth felt—- that smile planted a seed of grief in him, one that Seth knew would flourish regardless if he tended to it or not. Thinking about it, remembering it, would be enough nourishment.  
“Because it marks the end of another day in the sun, even if it’s the best day of your life, it’s the end of it. Twilight’s the last ditch effort to hold on, but it never really wins.”

All the parts of his brain that weren’t tainted yet, the parts that told him he can’t give up, were the same parts that told Seth to memorize Roman’s features. This was the time to drink in every line around the older man’s eyes, the furrow of his brow when he spoke, the pout of his upper lip as he looked at Seth with an intensity that could only be labeled as honest concern. Seth did as his thoughts commanded, letting his eyes carefully explore Roman before he responded:  
“Nobody wins all the time.”

Roman nodded. “The end of one day is the start of another, right?”

Seth rolled his shoulders in a shrug. “Kinda goes without saying.”

More than anything, Seth wanted keep looking at Roman. Those eyes, such a brilliant blue would pierce into him, maybe cut him up—cut out the parts of him that were knotted up in indecision. But all at once, he didn’t want to meet eyes. The intimacy was too much and only added to the weight of his shame for everything he knew was inevitable. At last, he turned away from the older man and back to the world that was now fully drenched in darkness. And Roman immediately spoke, soft and low:

“I guess I just needed to hear you agree with that.”


End file.
